Bill would give health coverage to uninsured cancer patients

AUSTIN (AP) - Some uninsured women could get treatment for breast or cervical cancer under a bill pending before the Senate Health and Human Services Committee.

"It will save lives," bill sponsor Jane Nelson, R-Flower Mound, said Thursday. "There are many women who are low income who are diagnosed with cancer who don't get treatment."

The bill would provide Medicaid benefits to uninsured women between the ages of 50 and 64 who are identified through the National Breast and Cervical Cancer Early Detection Program and are in need of breast or cervical cancer treatment

The committee heard testimony on the bill Thursday but left it pending. Chairman Mike Moncrief, D-Fort Worth, is not allowing any bills that will cost the state additional money to move out of committee until he gets an indication from legislative budget writers that the bill could be funded.

The state budget is tight, with Medicaid costs eating away at the expected budget surplus.

If the breast and cervical cancer bill was implemented, it would cost the state about $1.19 million over two years, Nelson said.

Advocates of the bill say that the state would likely save money over the long run because women would likely be treated earlier, lessening the long-term health care costs to the state.

"If women know that when they go for screenings they could get treatment, it's more likely they will go," said Claire Saxton, executive director of the Breast Cancer Research Center of Austin.

Nelson said about 200 women a year in Texas would be affected by the bill.

The Senate Health and Human Services Committee also approved a bill that would no longer require that the personal information of family violence shelter centers, sexual assault program workers or clients be made public. The bill also would no longer require that the location of a family violence shelter be part of the public record.